Reading Diary B: West African Folktales

The Moon and Stars

Moon and Stars

A lack of food is a main theme throughout these stories. Also father Anansi the spider from the first story is also in all of these stories.

There is also someone trying to tick someone else out of food or wealth. This story involves a dragon trying to gather the food.

Father Anansi was curious about this dragon that his son had seen. 

In the end the evil dragon looses and Anansi became the moon.

Reading Diary A:West African Folktales

How We Got the Name "Spider Tales"

Lizard eating spider

The spider in this story was very jealous that all the stories told were about Nyankupon, the chief of Gods. He wanted people to hear his stories.

He had to bring the chief of Gods three items for his wish to come true. 

He tricked the bees, a snake, and a tiger into going to the chief. Nyankupon was very surprised by the spider's smarts, so he allowed all old tales to be called Anansi tales. 

Tit For Tat

This story involves Anansi again. He follows his son to where all the animals live. There is a great famine and people can't afford to buy meat. 

The father, Anansi, was very selfish, but his son had outsmarted him. He was able to trick his father and become very rich selling the meat his father caught. 

In the end, Anansi promised to stop his evil tricks, but it didn't last very long. 

Thoughts about Comments

I think the best comments are the ones that help with the current story, but could be applied to future stories as well. Those types of comments are the best to help me in the class. My favorite comments that stick with me are the ones on my introduction. I get to know people and we can compare how our lives are similar!

Extra Reading Diary: Jamaica Anansi Stories

Jamaica Anansi Stories

Tying Tiger

This was very interesting to read. The language was a little difficult to follow, but overall was a pretty cool story of a Tiger and his mango tree!Basically the thing I got out of the story was that the tiger was tied to his tree and needed help getting untied... I think.

New Names

So in this story, four friends change their name and if their mother's call them by their old name they must eat their mothers. That's what I got out of the first chapter. I don't really understand the point of this story either. I should have probably picked a different unit to read, but I must say it is interesting to read other culture's stories. It's like trying to solve a puzzle! 

Storytelling Week 5: Adam & Eve

Adam & Eve

            Once long ago when the heavens and the earth were created, the all mighty creator became very lonely. Sure, he had different spirits and angels around but they weren’t the same as someone that looked and acted like him. He decided to create creatures in his image to entertain himself.

            The very smart and intuitive God decided to use different soils around the world when creating his new creatures. This would make all of the offspring of this creature all different but still the same. After this creature named Adam was created, God decided he needed a partner in crime to roam the newly formed earth. When he breathed life into Adam, he commanded the creature split equally into allowing the second creature, Eve, to form. The only rule was to not eat the caramel coated apples from the tree of knowledge. It lasted a good 15 hours before the creatures were overcome by curiosity and devoured the whole tree in minute.

            Weeks later the creators become very sick and started to age rather rapidly. The creatures created by God were not happy. They turned selfish and wanted to be smarter than anything else in the Universe.

            “Hey God, I’m not very happy with this whole situation you so rudely put us in,” Adam said with an aggravated tone.

            “You should be so grateful! You were mere dust of the earth before I made you, and now that you have broken my one and only rule, you shall pay,” God bellowed down to Adam.

            “Yeah well that’s not my problem. I’m done with your stupid rules. I’m doing whatever I want from now on,” Adam said.

            “Honey, please stop acting like a fool. You are seriously embarrassing me,” Eve groaned.

            “I’m acting like the fool? You were the one that that made me eat that stupid fruit and now look what has happened to us,” Adam glared at Eve.

            “Are you serious Adam? Your fat ass couldn’t wait 20 minutes for my chicken to be cooked so you decided to get some fruit from some snake thing and feed us. Maybe if you would help me more around the house and do your part, we wouldn’t be in this position we are in,” Eve screamed back.

“Seriously guys, I gave you one rule and now you’ve screwed everything up. For your punishment you will live a very long life TOGETHER and never separate.  You will be forced to walk the earth for 2 million years before you wither away a slow and painful death. Maybe next you will listen to me instead of being complete idiots,” God said shaking his head. “And further more, you must learn to live in harmony and show your children how to live in harmony or your whole race will be plagued by war and suffering,”

And that's the story of how one terrible couple supposably screwed everything up for the entire human race!

Author's Note:
So I took a spin on the whole Adam & Eve story from Our Father Adam. I basically kept the same plot, but tried to add some modern day dialogue. I didn't want to change it up too much and be offensive.

Bibliography:
Book: Folk-lore of the Holy Land: Moslem, Christian and Jewish
Author: J. E. Hanauer
Year: 1907

Reading Diary B: Folklore of the Holy Land: Moslem, Christian and Jewish

Solomon

Solomon and the animals

So this story is about a King named Solomon. The names were a little weird to read. Apparently Solomon could speak the language of the plants. That could be a fun little back story on how he got that power. A plant has told Solomon that all of his work would be destroyed. I really didn't understand this story all that much. I won't be choosing this story to rewrite.  

Reading Diary A: Folklore of the Holy Land: Moslem, Christian and Jewish

Folklore of the Holy Land: Moslem, Christian and Jewish

Islamic Art: Adam and Eve

Our Father Adam

I chose this unit because it is tied to all three monotheistic religions. I love comparing and contrasting all three. People fight and die over religion, but I find it interesting that all three have way more in common than they would like to admit. I like how this version says that Adam was made with different soils from around the world which created different "colours" of men and women around the world. I thought it was different that Adam and Eve were one body and then Eve decided to be her own woman. Overall I like this story. It was a little different than what I have read in the past but still had the same plot.

Noah

This story is basically the same as the story in the bible that I grew up reading. This version also included a giant like the version I read last week. It was a little more sinister than the version I would read when I was little.

                                        

Extra Reading Diary: Eskimo Folk Tales

Eskimo Folk Tales

Eskimos

The Coming of Men, A Long, Long While Ago

I love to read how other cultures think the earth was formed. I like how they incorporate the Eskimo's dogs in the story too. It is very interesting that they didn't have death and they could also burn water. I thought it was interesting how they believe that the sky is shining with stars because the dead leave the earth and shine brightly. 

The Insects that Wooed a Wifeless Man

This is kind of a creepy story. It's sad that the girls cheered when the wifeless man didn't come back home. I'll be honest, I didn't really understand what was going on during this story. Like I understand the plot but there were some stuff that went over my head. 

Story Telling Week 4: Scheherazade's Web

Once upon a time, long long ago, there was Sultan that was madly in love with his wife. After many years of happiness, the Sultan found out that his wife had been cheating on him since their first day of marriage. He was so hurt and ashamed that he had her beheaded. His heart turned black and hard as a stone. He thought he could never trust another woman.

            He felt lonely after a few months and decided he would take a new wife every night and the next morning he would kill her before she had the chance to disappoint him.

            The whole town was in a frenzy after they found out what was happening. Everyone was so afraid of the crazy Sultan. Word spread throughout the kingdom of the horrible murdering Sultan. A very special woman heard the horrible tales and decided to do something about the problem.

            She traveled for two weeks to reach the horrible Sultan. When she arrived in the town she went straight to his house. It was afternoon and the Sultan was on the prowl for his next victim.

            “Sultan, I have come to end your ways of suffering. Take my hand in marriage tonight and I can show you how happy you can truly be,” the wise woman said.

            “What is your name woman,” the Sultan asked.

            “I’m Scheherazade Latrodectus, but you can call me BW. I can make all your dreams and desires come true,” the woman said.

            The Sultan married the woman the woman knowing he would kill her the next day. As they both lie in bed, BW started telling the tales of her past. She had the Sultan engrossed in her black-eye stare.

As the Sultan listened, he noticed that he became very tired and almost hypnotized. What the he didn’t know was that BW was not actually human. She was the fabled black widow that would use her storytelling to put her husband in a trance before killing him.

The Sultan fell flat on the bed just as BW finished her final story. Right before closing his eyes, he was shocked to see the beautiful BW had transformed into a horrible eight legged, poisonous fanged monster.  

She frantically wrapped him in her constricting-poisonous web that would slowly kill him overnight. She wanted to make sure though that he would never hurt another woman in the town. Instead of leaving him to slowly die, she decided it best to inject her deadly venom into his heart to seal the deal.

The next morning, the Sultan’s staff woke up to the horror of what happened the night before. BW was nowhere in sight. The news quickly spread across the town and the town’s people celebrated for a month straight.

BW left the town feeling good that she saved so many innocent lives. She still roams the world to this day, seeking justice for those that can’t seek it themselves.

Woman Spider

Author's Note:

This story is loosely based on Arabian Nights: Scheherazade. In the original story, a Sultan was betrayed by his wife, so he kills her and then takes in a new wife every night. Before the new wife can betray him though, he kills her the next day. Scheherazade wants to stop the killings so she decides to marry the Sultan. Instead of being killed everyday, she tells the Sultan an ongoing story and says he will have to wait until the next day to hear the ending. It was really fun incorporating a different legend into this classic story. I tried some of the same plot line in the story, but I had to put a scary twist to it. I liked turning Scheherazade into a half human/half spider heroin that swoops in and saves the town people from the evil Sultan.  The reason I chose this image was because I wanted to show the reader that Scheherazade could morph from human to spider form. I thought this was a great image that could capture that moment where she was in mid transition from human to spider. I think it's a creepy photo as well. My overall goal was to make a traditional story have a more sinister plot twist. 

Bibliography:

Book: The Arabian Nights' Entertainments

Author: Andrew Lang

Illustrator: H. J. Ford

Year: 1898

Reading Diary B: Arabian Nights

Arabian Nights

Genie from Aladdin

Aladdin & The Wonderful Lamp

I absolutely love this part of the story. Growing up as a Disney kid, this was one of my favorite movies to watch. I'm excited to see how similar and different the two are.

This story is a little more sinister than the disney version so far. 

I like how the plot line has some similarities to a classic Disney movie, but I could spin this classic tale around into something even more fun and playful!

I like how he uses the genie to transport the princesses to his house instead of riding the "magic carpet". That thing always freaked me out a little. 

I think I will choose this story to rewrite. It has a really good plot line that would be easy to change and manipulate into the third chapter of my ongoing chronicles of the Barn Yard Continent. 

Halloween Legends: Styles Brainstorm

Jack-O-Lanterns

Topic: My Storybook will involve different urban legends and stories told around halloween. My favorite holiday is Halloween, so I want to play around with how it all started and intertwine different legends and myths about the holiday. Growing up I loved reading Disney's Haunted Mansion Pop-Up Book  so I think it would be very fun to add that aspect to my storytelling.  I would also like to incorporate some aspect of the Disney Channel Original Movie Halloween Town. There is also a collection of halloween stories on CD that I had as a kid that would be excellent for this project. I've tried researching but I can't seem to find it. I'll have to call home and ask what it was. Another great resource I would love to use is Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark series. I loved listening to the audiobooks as a kid. They have some very scary stories that would work well with my theme.

Illustrations from Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark

Bibliography:
1. Book Title: Haunted Mansion Pop-Up Book 
Book Author: Chuck Murphy
Year: 1994

2. Book Title: Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark (series)
Book Author: Alvin Schwartz
Illustrator: Stephen Gammell
Year: 1981-1991

Possible Styles:

Third-Person Style: I will use the third-person style of writing just because I anticipate having a good amount of characters in my stories and I think it would be less confusing to the reader if I write in third-person. My story will reflect on the urban legends of Halloween so I will involve multiple characters.

Frametale: I definitely want all my characters to be connected in a way that shows how halloween got it's start and how their stories live on to this day. I want to show how all these "monsters" came together to create a holiday that celebrates them.

Young Adult Fiction: Even though some of these stories are meant for children, I want to vamp of the fear factor in my stories to make them as scary as possible. I am a haunted house, scary movie junkie so the scarier the better!

Newspaper Writing: I think it would be neat to incorporate some type of news writing into my project. I could show how these tales were based off real people and the urban legends just started popping up adding different details to the stories.

I am very excited to let my creativity flow during this project. I have forgotten how fun it is to let my creativity over take me.

Reading Diary A: Arabian Nights

Arabian Nights

Scheherazade

Scheherazade

I absolutely love this story! I did a presentation on Scheherazade the musical piece Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov last semester. This story gives a great plot line to really work your imagination and run wild with different plot lines. It's a tragic that's not tragic. I really love the whole story and I love the pice that Korsakov composed for it.

The Merchant and the Genius

The Merchant and the Genius

I like this story because it is the building block of Scheherazade's whole story that allows her to live through the next day. It's a story within a story, and I always love reading and writing stories like that. This is just a great plot to build off of and write a very fun and entertaining story!

Essay: Week 3 Readings

I'm still not sure how I feel about this week’s reading. I wasn't as interested this week as I was last week. I did have fun combining this week's story to my week one story. I daydream a lot so it wasn't hard to morph it into a "chapter two" from the original. I hope I can keep finding different stories throughout the semester to maybe do three or four more "chapters" in these connected stories.

Like I've said before, I'm into the scary folklore type of writing so this unit really didn't keep my attention all that well. I hope to spend more time with the UnTextbook to really find those scary, creepy stories that I really like.

I must say though that I liked all the different elements to some classic stories I grew up reading. I don't ever remember reading about a giant on a unicorn when Noah loaded up the arch so that was fun. I also just love learning about different cultures and seeing how many similarities we all have with one another. It is very fascinating. 

I really enjoy how different cultures also try to teach virtues and values to people through stories. Each culture has their own way of showing how to be nice to one another, or always doing the right thing. I also like seeing how people think different things came to be. This week I was able to see why some people think cats and dogs don't get along. It's very fascinating how all these old stories still can play a big part in our modern culture. 

After this week, I have realized I need to definitely work ahead. It is such a different dynamic than what I normally used to. I also want to have more time when I write my stories to really let my imagination run wild and have a solid storyline. 

Noah's Ark

Storytelling Week 3: Canine & Feline Kingdoms

   
A long long time ago in a land where animals ruled the world, two unlikely animal kingdoms formed a great alliance. It had been fifty years since the Poultry Kingdom had fallen to the reptiles, and the world had been pushed into the dark ages. If you weren't a reptile, life was very hard.
The Canine and Feline Kingdoms were the only ones left after the reptiles ravaged the Barn Yard continent.
     "Something has to be done about the reptiles before they completely destroy our homes and way of life," King Cat said to Queen Dog.
     "We must work together to insure both of our kingdoms don't come crashing down like the Poultry Kingdom so long ago," Queen dog demanded.
     "We will fight to the death if we have to," King Cat declared!
     King Cat and Queen Dog decided to come together to bring the great people of the Barn Yard continent out of the dark ages and banish the reptiles to the jungles.
     It took several years, but the Canine and Feline Kingdoms finally took control over the reptiles and banished them to the jungles of the world.
     A problem arose when the kingdoms decided to split the land. King Cat thought he deserved more land since he spend more than Queen Dog, but Queen Dog thought she deserved more land because she had lost more soldiers during the fight.
     The intense negotiations went on for months. The arguments became more and more tense. The two allies started to hate each other. Their egos got in the way of a great power house.
     The reptiles heard of the conflict between the ruling kingdoms and decided to take advantage of the situation. They started sabotaging each kingdom making it look like the other kingdom had done the dirty work. Pretty soon the reptiles had each kingdom ready to go to war with each other.
     One cold winter night, the Feline Kingdom decided to attack the Canines. This started a chain of events that that would lead to a millennia of war and hate between the two kingdoms. The reptiles would watch and wait for the right time to take over their rule again of the Barn Yard continent.

A dog and cat face off.

Author's Note: My story is very loosely based off The Quarrel of the Cat and Dog. I also tied this story in with my first story The Poultry Kingdom. I wanted to try and continue the story and challenge myself to combine the two. I hope to continue the story of the Barn Yard Continent. 

Bibliography:

Book: Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends

Author: Gertrude Landa 

Year: 1919

Reading Diary A: Jewish Fairy Tales

Jewish Fairy Tales

The Giant of the Flood:

Noah's Ark

I really enjoyed this story. It was a fun twist on an old tale. I had never heard of anything like this in the bible. I don't think I would want to chose this story to rewrite. 

The Quarrel of the Cat & Dog:

CatDog

This tale was really funny and thoughtful! We've always heard that cats and dogs never get along but I never understood why everyone thinks that. I think it would be fun to rewrite this tale and mix it up with the popular Nick show CatDog.

Myth/Folklore Topics Brainstorming

Topic: Ancient Egyptians Tales
Comments: Since I was a little kid, I have always been fascinated by the Egyptian pyramids and mummies. In a past post, I talked about how one of my favorite movies was the Mummy. Egyptian culture has been skewed in our media so I think it would be a fun project to really understand the ancient civilization and see how it compares to what we see in movies and on tv.
Possible Stories: There are some great stories in the Ancient Egyptians Myths  & Stories but I would like to focus on either on the Creation or The Secret Name of Ra .
Sample Story Comments: I read through Creation and I think it would be really fun to put a twist on the legend. Also, growing up in a Christian church, it would be really fun to do more research on how that culture thought everything came into existence.
Bibliography Information:
Sample Story: Creation
Book Title: Egyptian Myth & Legend
Book Author: Donald Mackenzie
Year: 1913

Depiction of the Nun deity. 

Topic: The Undead
Comments: Halloween is just around the corner and it it my favorite holiday! I love anything that is spooky and scary. I am a big fan of the show The Waling Dead on AMC. There has to be a lot of zombie folklore in different cultures around the world. It will be interesting to see how they all differ. Is there a way I can search different topics within the UnTextbook?
Possible Stories: I'm not sure if I want to take the zombie route or more of a vampire route when doing this topic. Either one would be really fun to do. I'll do some more research and see what I can find.
Sample Story Comments:  I stumbled upon Russia: The Dead Mother and I feel like it could have some major potential to be turned into something really great. Maybe put something like a Tim Burton's Corpse Bride twist on it.
Bibliography Information:
Sample Story: The Dead Mother
Book Title: Russian Fairy Tales: A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore
Book Author: W. R. S. Ralston
Year: 1887

Zombie Mom

Topic: The Creation in the Bible

Comments: I've grown up in church all my life so the bible is nothing new to me, but as a kid I would always imagine different story ideas when reading the Bible. I think it would really be fun to put a light-hearted twist to the Creation story of the bible.

Possible Stories: I would definitely use Adam and Eve: The Creation for this topic. Maybe I can find other culture's view on creation and mash them up.

Sample Story Comments: The Adam and Eve: The Creation is nothing to me but I want to write about what God is actually thinking when this whole process is happening. Some might think it's blasphemous but I think God has a good sense of humor.

Bibliography Information:

Sample Story: Adam and Eve: The Creation

Book: The Holy Bible - King James

Creation of Adam

Topic: Czech Witches

Comments: As I've said before, my dad's side of the family comes from the Czech republic so I really want to dive into the folklore of the culture. On the plus side there is a supernatural area in our UnTexbook that would be really fun to explore and build off of.

Possible Stories: There two stories that I found on the Czech: Three Supernatural Stories that would be fun to write from. I really like the Witches at the Cross story. I kept thinking about the Disney move Hocus Pocus.

Sample Story Comments: I really like the two witch stories in the section because it gives just enough of a story to understand what is going on, but you can use your imagination to really go wild on the backstory and the character development. 

 Bibliography Information:

Sample Story:

Book Title: The Key of Gold: Czech Folk Tales

Book Author: Josef Baudis

Year: 1922

The Incantation

Essay: Tragedy & Knowledge of Aseop for Children (Winter)

This week I chose to read Aseop for Children (Winter). I found it very interesting that these stories were on the verge of being morbid for children to read. Each story tried to teach a lesson about not being greedy, or too full of yourself, etc. I did like that the stories used mainly talking animals to get the point across. I feel like if they had used children instead of animals it would have been too much for younger readers.

The story I keep thinking of the most is The Tortoise and the Ducks. This poor little tortoise just wants to see the world without worrying about his house (i.e. shell) being carried with him. Then these birds decide to take him on a flight by having him bite a stick. All of a sudden this tortoise goes to speak and he falls to his death. I think I could label this as a “tragedy”. I felt bad for the little guy.

The one thing I did keep comparing these stories with was the cartoon series LittleBear. I grew up watching the show. It was a show that had talking animals that interacted with humans as well. The characters throughout the show would learn lessons about life the same way the characters in Aseop for Children did but the way the cartoon was made, it was less morbid. The setting for the cartoon was the same for these stories as well. It had a very 1800s feel to all the episodes.

Little Bear

The more I read these short stories the more I wondered what it was like growing up almost 200 years ago. I feel like the parents were very blunt with their kids. Both of my parents are elementary principals so I will have to ask them what they think about this book and how it could be used today without overbearing parents completely freaking out.